Procrastinate Now

Aggravated mumbling could be heard from a cubical slightly after lunch, “And....now. Nope, damn…Okay, NOW! Nope, still nothing.” These words rose from Tanner’s cubical as he desperately tried to fix his Charlie Brown Pez dispenser. Ever since he had dropped it that morning, it hadn’t worked and now his after lunch Pez was trapped inside. Disgusted, he turned to his computer and stared at the blank screen. He knew he should be working, but he didn’t know where to start. He had four days to prepare 85 percent of the music, and 90 percent of the words to his one-man show that he was going to perform 100 percent of on Saturday.

He couldn’t believe his show was picked up in the first place. Now, he wished the show would’ve gone unnoticed. He always tried to work on the show in his apartment, but never got anything accomplished because his neighbor was always playing his music 140 decibels above the comfortable playing level. Also, Tanner wished his neighbor would stop singing along, but it wasn’t so much singing as it was yelling violently. Recently, he had tried to retaliate by playing his R.E.M Greatest Hits cd as loud as possible. Unfortunately, he couldn’t play it very loudly because the stereo started to vibrate and then the cd skipped. Then, he tried recording some of his own music onto his computer, but sadly Tanner could not play some of the instruments he had very well. He played well enough to have his own show, but not well enough to drown out the racket coming from next door. The small amount of music Tanner did record sounded like somebody fell down some stairs as they were carrying instruments. He’ll have to fix that later. Then it dawned upon him, he doesn’t have “later,” he needed to finish soon and his sound skirmishes with his neighbor were not helping.

Tanner now decided he would work on his show at, well, work. He never did much there because he is a no name assistant to some third tier executive. Clearly, Tanner had plenty of free time. He filled the gaps in the day by answering the telephone and sitting in his chair. Sometimes, he would turn the chair around so his chest was against the backrest, but he only did that when he felt like doing something wild. Tanner was actually sitting like that when he thought of doing his one-man show. Truthfully, the show is just Tanner standing on stage telling amusing anecdotes and funny stories he has written. Not a really big deal, but at least he was getting paid to do it.

Tanner thought, “Maybe if I sit like I was when I thought of my show, I’ll have more inspiration.” So, Tanner sat and sat and sat, but nothing happened. Well, something did happen, Tanner fell asleep and woke up with a note stuck to his desk. It had some words on it as all notes do, but these were words Tanner did not want to see at that moment. “You’re fired sleepyhead” was printed in bold letters across the paper. Tanner was given a box that he was supposed to put all his heavy office things into.

As he walked up the stairs to his apartment carrying his large box, he thought “My life has really only been a lot of sitting with a few periods of carrying heavy things up flights of stairs.” Tanner had sat around and daydreamed as a child, that is until he was forced to get a job. He delivered large packages to people in apartment buildings, who always seemed to live on the top floor. After that, Tanner sat around some more until he had to go to college. Then he carried all his heavy college supplies up the stairs to his dorm room. Upon graduating, he sat in his parent’s basement while he looked for a job. When he found his job, he carried all his heavy stuff up more stairs to his first apartment. Now, here Tanner is carrying heavy stuff up a flight of stairs to his apartment. Tanner thought out loud to himself, “These heavy things must be a symbol or something. They probably symbolize all the difficult tasks and times of my life.” Tanner likes to think out loud because it keeps strangers from talking to him. He thinks that everyone should try it sometime, because it is very effective.

Tanner then sat down on the end of his bed. He looked around and saw things strewn everywhere. His guitar was leaning against the wall, a stack of old newspapers were on his desk, clothes were on the floor, a box of Chocolate Lucky Charms was on his table next to a two day old bowl of cereal that he hadn’t finished. Tanner then had a brilliant idea; this was going to be the set of his show. It was as simple as taking all his stuff and throwing it on stage to make it look like apartment 413 where he lived. Tanner, in a rush, took out a pen and some paper because he could feel the ideas flowing. He sat there for 3 hours and got two lines written. “How’s everyone doing tonight” and “Thank you all for coming out, I hope you had a wonderful time.” He then went to bed miserable. Tanner now had three days left to write 85 percent of the music and 90 percent of the words to his one-man show.